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It’s been nearly a year since Will left Chicago Med, and Jack warned he’d have to sell the hospital. But our favorite Chicago hospital drama is finally back!
Chicago Med Season 9 Episode 1 will waste no time, kicking off with a crisis: a car crash that has caused multiple serious injuries.
It’s all part of life in the ED at Med, but the drama is about to get personal for Dr. Charles.
Spoilers say that Charles will run into a familiar face. The person in question is the new ED director, Dr. Ripley — and he and Charles had a different sort of relationship years ago.
There’s not much info about who this guy is yet, but the One Chicago trailer for Chicago Med Season 9 features a clip of him telling Charles to stop seeing him as the kid he was two decades ago. So it’s likely he’s a past patient who’d like to forget he ever needed therapy.
That’s not entirely original.
Dr. Charles spent the better part of a year winning over skeptical Dr. Archer, who didn’t consider psychiatry to be a legitimate medical field and resisted attending a mandatory session for as long as possible.
But this time is a bit different since Charles and Dr. Ripley have a history. What is in Ripley’s past that he doesn’t want anyone to know about?
This could be a. mystery that unfolds throughout the season or something that is resolved in the first few episodes. I prefer slow burns, so hopefully, the whole story will take a while.
In the meantime, we can expect Dr. Charles to butt heads with Ripley repeatedly, which might lead to partial reveals of the truth.
There might not be much time to deal with it during the premiere episode, though, because they’ll be dealing with a ton of car crash victims.
Emergency situations like this are risky to depict on television. This tired TV trope is so common that many viewers have become desensitized.
Still, they’re a realistic part of emergency room dramas, offering meaty material for the entire cast.
The car crash and new ED director mean good news, too: obviously, the hospital survived the cliffhanger on Chicago Med Season 8 Episode 22.
There is no longer a billionaire and his investors funding things, but that is likely a positive development.
Jack spent most of Chicago Med Season 8 touting his technological inventions, which were double-edged swords.
OR 2.0 was helpful, but Marcel feared becoming too dependent on it.
Other doctors were uncomfortable with the technology, and WIll sabotaged the machine before leaving Med because it had made a critical error that cost a patient their life.
Now that the inventor’s been booted from the hospital, will that end the AI storylines?
AI continues to be a controversial advancement in many fields, with people fearing that automation will replace their jobs and debating the ethics of using AI in various capacities, so it would be a shame to lose that aspect of the story.
Plus, Marcel became proficient at using OR 2.0 and was able to perform previously impossible surgeries, so it feels like throwing the baby out with the bathwater to drop the entire OR 2.0 arc now that Jack’s gone.
And with all these car crash victims, OR 2.0 and other advanced technology would likely be a big help.
Finally, what’s up with Dr. Archer?
He’s not the ED director anymore since Dr. Ripley is taking over that role, and his kidney disease was interfering with his ability to do his job on Chicago Med Season 8 Episode 21.
According to spoilers, Dr. Archer is finally about to get his kidney transplant.
His previous attempt went nowhere because Sean relapsed, and you have to be six months sober to donate an organ.
There’s likely been a time jump since the finale — is Sean clean enough to donate now, or has Archer managed to find another donor?
In any case, he’s supposed to have second thoughts on the eve of the transplant. Archer likely knows this is the only way he’ll be able to survive the disease, so his problem may be with his donor.
That would make sense if it were Sean. He’s overprotective of his newly sober son’s mental health and has been concerned from the beginning that allowing Sean to donate wouldn’t be good for him.
After spending the day in the ED dealing with a crisis, Archer may also dread having to be laid up for weeks following the surgery.
Ignoring his symptoms caused him to collapse in the ED before, so changing his mind about the transplant because of one adrenalin-fueled day is a terrible idea.
But Archer’s the kind of doctor who makes the worst sort of patient. He knows enough about medicine to hide his condition, is skeptical of what other doctors think, and is too married to his career to take time off for surgery.
Hopefully, Hannah will be able to talk him through whatever issue he’s facing.
That’s what has been happening throughout this storyline, with Archer getting pissed every time Asher points out that he can’t go on like this, only to listen to her in the end.
Hannah’ll have her hands full during the crisis, so it may be a while before she gets to Archer’s nonsense. Spoiler photos include her delivering a baby — is it a crash victim’s baby or a patient’s baby that has nothing to do with the crisis?
What do you think, Chicago Med fanatics?
What storylines excite you most as the new season finally gets underway?
Hit the big, blue SHOW COMMENTS button to let us know, and don’t forget to check back for our Chicago Med review after the episode airs.
Chicago Med airs on NBC on Wednesdays at 8/7c and is available to stream on Peacock the next day. The ninth season premiere will air on January 17, 2024.
Jack Ori is a senior staff writer for TV Fanatic. His debut young adult novel, Reinventing Hannah, is available on Amazon. Follow him on X.